The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1887-08-06
A COLORADO OASIS.
1t Lies Close by Vast Basin of Pure
Salt, and Seems Paradise.
From the San Francisco A,gonuut.

Net4Gy SiilAS SSSLlS eb dSN4RSS.
From the San Francisco 4rgoRaut.
In the middle of the Colorado desert there
is curious depression in the earth's surface,
through which the Southern Pacific rail
road runs. The lowest point is 260 feet
below the sea level, and here is a great
body of salt, more pure than any known to
commerce, and in an abundance that may
supply the world if all other resources should
be exhausted From point on the road
called Indio the descent is rapid to this
place of salt. 1t was once an inland sea,
from which the waters have apparently
passed away by evaporation, leaving salt
deposit that resembles ice. Standing upon
its margin, we look upon a perfectly level
and white crust of salt some 80 or 40 miles
in length by perhaps 90 in width. A tram
way Is laid over the crust to a distance of
more than mile, over which steam
dummy and train of freight cars run to the
mill where the salt is ground. Beyond the
mill a smaller engine pushes its smaller
cars further out upon the salt crust where
the salt is gathered The process of
collecting is very simple. Laborers, pro-
vided each with wheelbarrow, shovel, and
adze, go out upon the salt field, pick the
surface to the depth of an inch or two,
gather barrow loads and wheel them to the
cars. This salt crust varies i'll thickness: i'll
some places it is but few inches above the
mud and water, and some places nearly
five feet IN thickness. Liverpool salt must
be kiln-dried before being ground. Nature
sends this to the mill SO dry that it may be
ground as fine as flour. At the mill it is
bagged and marked for shipment, and is
ready for table or dairy use This salt is
20 per cent pure, and is placed upon the
market as New Liverpool" 1t is I'M
doubleday the purest salt in the market.
1t is on the rising slope from this salt
mlne some twenty miles away, and in the
very heart of the great Colorado desert,
that the Southern Pacific people have
feet a flow Of / 800 gallons an hour has been
brought to the surface. The bore is being
pushed downward for further demonstra-
ton. This discovery of artesian water has
caused the location of about two townships
of land, which is of good soil, being covered
with growth of mesquite shrubbery and
weeds. At the station, Indio, where the
company had found water for train use by
pumping, there is a growth of pepper,
locust, cottonwood, and palm trees, all doing
well and attaining great growth. Grapes,
watermelons, tomatoes, roses, geraniums,
and morning glories are there seen in
tiourishing condition. Grapes and water
melons ripen in June.
The gentlemen who have located this
tropical Eden will experiment in the direc-
ton of tropical productions. Already they
talk of cotton, coffee, and tobacco. That it
will produce better oranges than San
Bernardino or Riverside they do not doubt.
San Francisco is to receive from this para
disc its early waternelons, its berries, adj
sweet potatoes. Only few miles from the
line of the road is a grove of 1000 date
palms, reaching great height, and bearing
the real but very small and inferior date
The foot hills are skirted all along with
these palm trees. In these mountains, it is
said, are productive valleys well supplied
with water, but it sinks when it touches the
level of the plain. This is a marvellous and
wonderful land, and nothing caused the
writer greater surprise than the soil and
water discoveries constantly being made in
these desert places. Places that are very
inaccessible, that are embedded in mountain
canons and away from civilization, are be-
coming the luxurious homes of industrious
and enterprising people who have the
nerve to 60 somewhat beyond the confines
and boundaries of present genteel life.
What Gods blessing it would be to the
members of Henry Georges Anti Poverty
party if some kind, powerful genie would
clothe them all, and then lift them up out
of the city slums, tenement houses, politics,
gin, idleness, and crime, into these mountain
and desert homes where poverty is only
known and restitution only felt by those
who are unable or unwilling to toll